by Metropolitan Hilarion – (From his address at the 10th Assembly of the World Council of Churches.)

In my address I would like to focus on two fundamental challenges which the Christian world today faces in varying degrees. The first is that of the militant secularism which is gathering strength in the so called developed countries, primarily in Europe and America. The second is that of radical Islamism that poses a threat to the very existence of Christianity in a number of regions of the world, mainly in the Middle East, but also in some parts of Asia and Africa.

Militant secularism in Europe has a long history going back to the period of the French revolution. But it is only in the twentieth century in the countries of the so called socialist bloc that godlessness was elevated to the level of state ideology. As regards the so called capitalist countries, they preserved to a significant degree the Christian traditions which shaped their cultural and moral identity. [Read more…]

by Robin Phillips –The pattern of persecution is being repeated in Syria as Muslim rebel groups seek both to overthrow the lawful government as well as to eliminate the native Christian population. Consequently, Christians in Syria are frightened to worship publicly and many have had to flee to refugee camps in neighbouring countries. …

The equilibrium in Syria began to be disrupted after the, so called, ‘Arab Spring’ hit the country in 2011. Rebel groups, many of whom have links to Al-Qaeda, began seeking to overthrow the government. Syria’s Christian population became engulfed in the crossfire of this civil war. Because most Christians in Syria have remained neutral in the two-year civil war and some have supported the government, the insurgents with the ‘Free Syrian Army’ perceive Christians as enemies. Consequently, they have begun systematically confiscating land belonging to Christians, in addition raping women and killing children. Dozens of churches have also been desecrated or completely destroyed, mainly around Homs and Aleppo.

Astoundingly, the anti-government ‘Free Syrian Army’ is considered moderate by the West and is supported by the David Cameron, the Obama administration, NATO and [Read more…]

by Editors –Obama’s and John McCain’s friends in Syria – the so-called “Syrian rebels” continue to bring death and destruction upon Christians and Christian churches in Syria. They’re nothing more than bloodthirsty killers seeking to impose Islamic law on the Syrian people.

The following describes some of the latest atrocities committed by Obama & McCain’s supposed allies in Syria:

DAMASCUS, SYRIA (BosNewsLife)– Mourning Christians in Syria were still awaiting answers Monday, July 8, as to why Islamic militants with links to opposition rebels entered Christian villages more than a month ago killing several people, including children, in what locals called a “massacre”.

Vatican-backed news agency Fides said the gunmen raided the village of al-Duwayr/Douar, outside the city of Homs near Lebanon, where they immediately executed a man and his daughter in their home and burned their bodies.

The fighters reportedly also occupied the village church from where snipers began firing at terrified civilians, killing an- 11-year-old boy and a girl of 18, [Read more…]

by Bill Warner –
If you are even slightly awake about the world news today, it is no surprise that Christians are being killed, raped, and brutalized throughout the Islamic world. However, there is a place where you can go to escape the dreadful and relentless details of Christian annihilation by Islam. You can just go to church.

For example, Christians were killed this week in Nigeria. Nothing out of the ordinary — indeed, in the world of Christian persecution, this is routine.

And so the response found in nearly every church to the murder of Christians is…wait for it…complete silence. Not a mention or reference to it, or to the brutality against Christians that happens almost every day in the Islamic world.

This is not a passive silence, because if you try to change it, you will fail. The silence is an active, working conspiracy that goes throughout nearly all of Christendom. [Read more…]

by Jason Bradley –
Contemporary Western thought and postmodern relativism compel us to explore our place in the world vis-à-vis other civilizations. The West’s legacy of reasoning is based heavily on thinkers such as Aristotle. The foundation he created implores us to consciously define and pursue an objective method to acquire knowledge. Where his philosophy was limited other thinkers came around and expanded this school of thought by use of Aristotle’s scientific epistemology. In other words, though his practice failed in some areas, his philosophical principles were sound in their fundamentals for the continuance in what we call Western thought.

It is on this foundation that we now seek the abstract and superimpose it over the idea of applied reality. Today’s thinkers exclude specific objects and dismiss concrete reality. Such is the case in when modern intellectuals study the question, “Why Do They Hate Us?” [Read more…]

A priest whose church was at the centre of sectarian riots at the weekend has said Egyptian Christians were “under organised attack” as religious authorities warned the country was at risk of civil war.

Armed troops and riot police guarded the streets around St Mena’s church and nearby burned-out shops and apartment blocks in the impoverished, crumbling Cairo suburb of Imbaba.

Inside, Father Cherubim Awad said a conspiracy was the only possible explanation for the violence that had engulfed relations between Christians and Muslims in recent weeks.

“Five churches were attacked on the same night,” he said. “From the beginning of this year we have had all these attacks in a short space of time.

“There is some hidden hand behind this, whether from inside the country or outside it.” [Read more…]

Last weekend’s scenes of anti-Christian mob violence in Cairo, against a background of churches in flames, is a powerful reminder of a grim reality: Non-Muslim communities have become endangered species throughout much of the Islamic world.

Some statesmen have begun to acknowledge the existential crisis facing non-Muslims. Former Lebanese Prime Minister Amine Gemayel warned earlier this year that Islamic extremists are waging a war of “genocide,’’ while French President Nicolas Sarkozy now refers to the region’s Christians as the victims of “a perverse program of … religious cleansing.’’

The most sensational acts of anti-Christian terror command headlines — for a moment. Such was the case when 41 worshippers at Baghdad’s Our Lady of Salvation Catholic Church were held hostage and then massacred by Islamic extremists last October, and 23 Egyptian Christians in Alexandria were killed by a bomb blast as they left mass early this year.

Pakistan’s only Christian Cabinet member, Shahbaz Bhatti — the minister for minority affairs — was shot dead in March. He was a critic of Pakistan’s blasphemy laws. [Read more…]

Sunday, on the eve of All Saints’ Day, Nov. 1, 2010, the faithful gathered at the Assyrian Catholic Church of Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad.

As Father Wassim Sabih finished the mass, eight al-Qaida stormed in, began shooting and forced him to the floor. As the priest pleaded that his parishioners be spared, they executed him and began their mission of mass murder.

When security forces broke in, the killers threw grenades to finish off the surviving Christians and detonated explosive-laden vests to kill the police. The toll was 46 parishioners and two priests killed, 78 others wounded, many in critical condition after losing limbs.

While Tariq Ramadan is hectoring Americans about “Islamophobia,” calling Muslims the new “blacks” in America, a synod is currently underway in the Vatican to save Christian communities in the Middle East’s Islamic countries from extinction. The flight of the region’s Christians to the West from the area where Christianity was born has reached such alarming proportions, Pope Benedict XVI gathered 285 delegates in Rome last Monday to investigate the phenomenon.

In his homily in St. Peter’s Cathedral to open the two-week synod, the Catholic pontiff called upon the delegates to scrutinize the situation with a “view to God” to ensure the region’s Christians can escape “discouragement” and “the temptation to flee.” The pope also indicated that the heart of problem lies in the threat Middle Eastern Christians face from Islamic radicalism, calling it, along with the international drug trade, “terroristic ideologies.

“Violent acts are apparently made in the name of God; but this is not God: they are false divinities that must be unmasked,” he said. [Read more…]

The Civilization of Islam
One of the clearest lessons about Islam is found in the Sharia. The largest part of the Sharia is devoted to regulating the life of Muslims down to the smallest detail. There is no aspect of life that is not regulated — sex, food, art, business, education, prayer, manners, speech, and how to think and not to think. There is no aspect of life that is outside the power of Sharia — religion, politics, ethics, and culture are included. The Sharia is the operating manual for a complete civilization. Islam is complete within itself and needs nothing from the outside. [Read more…]

CAIRO – Thousands clashed with police during a funeral procession Thursday for six of seven people killed in an attack on churchgoers leaving a midnight Mass for Coptic Christians, security officials said. Throughout the day, protesters in the southern town of Nag Hamadi pelted police with rocks and damaged cars and stores.

Early in the day, they smashed ambulances outside a hospital in frustration over delays in turning over the bodies for burial. A security official said police fired tear gas to disperse the crowd. [Read more…]

For if we are at war, why is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed headed for trial in federal court in the Southern District of New York? Why is he entitled to a presumption of innocence and all of the constitutional protections of a U.S. citizen? [Read more…]

There is a division of the house. On one side are the politically correct in government, the leftist mainstream media, and a raft of Islamist apologists. One and all are tripping over each other in reassuring us the mass murderers such as Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan and suicide-bombers who detonate their explosive vests in crowded marketplaces and even mosques are individual anomalies and Islam is not responsible for what they do.

On the other side are those fed up with the innumerable daily horrific acts throughout the world that are clearly committed under the banner of Islam. In all fairness, there needs to be a distinction. [Read more…]

History clearly teaches that great civilizations are not brought down by their external enemies, but that they undermine themselves from within. In other words, they essentially commit suicide. Islamists could never bring down an America determined to defend itself. We can, however, be toppled if refuse to take the commonsense measures necessary to safeguard our survival. Choosing not to obtain critical intelligence about impending attacks against our country is the equivalent of committing national suicide. [Read more…]